Nedunchaalai

7/7/2014

His debut film Sillunu Oru Kaadhal was largely a middling effort remembered mostly for AR Rahman's songs but with Nedunchalai, Krishna shows that the unevenness of that film could have been a case of nerves of a first-time director working with a star. For, this film is certainly a surefooted effort that shows that this director can tell an engaging tale. Like his debut film, this one too is a wistful journey of a character — if it was a man's longing for a lover in the earlier film, this one is about a man's regret over his action. The setting is the mid eighties and the plot revolves around a ruffian who is a better man than whom he seems to be, an always fashionable conceit in Tamil cinema. Here, it is Tarpaulin Murugan (Aari), a highway robber, who steals from lorries that ply on t